Groups' use of federal funds at heart of suits

January 05, 2006|FRANK JAMES Chicago Tribune

WASHINGTON Faith-based groups are barred from proselytizing or engaging in other obvious religious activity when using federal funds to encourage teenagers to abstain from premarital sex or help substance abusers fight addictions. But a number of groups may have run afoul of that federal prohibition. Lawsuits by the American Civil Liberties Union, Americans United for the Separation of Church and State and the Freedom from Religion Foundation accuse the faith-based organizations and the government of violating the constitutional separation of church and state. Meanwhile, experts say the Bush administration is doing too little to monitor religious groups receiving federal money. Critics cite the Silver Ring Thing program that preaches sexual abstinence to teens. It is known for pulsing, high-tech, multimedia shows at which teenagers can buy silver rings to symbolize their pledge to avoid sex until marriage. In the past year, the Health and Human Services Department suspended a grant of more than $1 million to Silver Ring Thing after the ACLU of Massachusetts sued the department, accusing it of mixing religion with the sexual-abstinence message. At the shows, Silver Ring Thing openly urged teenagers to commit their lives to Jesus Christ and the rings it sold were inscribed with a New Testament verse. "When the government looked into the situation in our case, they obviously came to the same conclusion, that in fact their grant was not being used properly and consistently with the Constitution," said Daniel Mach, a First Amendment expert at the Jenner & Block law firm that has represented the Massachusetts ACLU in the case. Experts on faith-based groups that receive federal funds say vague government rules have contributed to the situation, as has a lack of government monitoring. Although Catholic Charities, Lutheran Social Services and Jewish Family Services long ago learned to clearly separate religion from the government- funded social services they provide, experts say some new recipients of federal funding -- often groups operating out of churches, synagogues, mosques and storefronts -- are less careful. And critics say the monitoring of these groups has not kept pace with the increase in applicants for money since President Bush began lowering their barriers to federal funding in 2001. "There is little to no monitoring of faith content of services," Frederica Kramer, a scholar at the Urban Institute, a research organization here, said at a recent panel discussion on faith-based groups. Only the financial and auditing aspects of the social-service arrangements get scrutiny, said Kramer, who with other researchers published a report last year on faith-based groups they studied in Birmingham, Ala., Boston and Denver. According to the federal rules, faith-based groups receiving government aid for social service programs may not use federal dollars for any "inherently religious" activities. Further, participation in religious activities by someone who receives assistance must clearly be voluntary. And people receiving government money to fight substance abuse must be offered a nonreligious alternative if they voice discomfort with the use of a faith-based provider. But the rules are ambiguous in other areas, Ira Lupu, a George Washington University law school professor, told a conference last month in Atlanta sponsored by the Roundtable on Religion and Social Welfare Policy. "Is it permissible," he asked, "to have religious themes, religious content, religious activity, religious focus, religious transformation as part of social service? As part of work training? As part of substance-abuse counseling? As a part of sexual-abstinence teaching?" Urban Institute researchers discovered an after-school child-care program run by a faith-based group that was cited by federal officials as a model, yet it was using Bible stories to teach reading skills to young children. Bush administration officials defend their efforts to inform faith-based organizations on what is and isn't allowed. "I wouldn't necessarily agree there's not enough guidance," said Josephine Robinson, director of the Office of Community Services within the Health and Human Services Department. Her office funds programs in four "priority" areas: assisting at-risk youths, combating homelessness, providing assistance to rural communities, and promoting healthy marriages. "We provide significant training and guidance to all of our grantees ... about the explicit separation of religious activity and proselytizing from any activities that are funded by (government) money," she said. In the three months since she assumed daily responsibility for the community services office, she said she has increased monitoring, requiring two reviews of the paperwork submitted by the faith-based groups, one by outside contractors and another by her office. She acknowledged, however, that there are limits to how much direct monitoring of grant recipients can be done by her office. She has a staff of only four and restrictions on travel for on-site visits necessitate reliance on written reports and phone contacts with the estimated 330 groups the office oversees. Jeffrey Trimbath, director of Health and Human Service's abstinence-education program, which funded Silver Ring Thing, said he could not discuss the case because of the ACLU's pending lawsuit. Operating under different federal regulations than Robinson, Trimbath said he hopes his Washington-based staff of six would be able to visit all 144 community-based abstinence-education programs over a three-year period. To date, he said, "probably five" have gotten "formal site visits."